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Only three months into a lackluster administration Pence seems haunted by the large shadow of his predecessor, former Gov. Mitch Daniels.

That’s to be expected, of course, as Daniels was a barnstorming, big-idea governor who won over even many Democrats with his willingness to tackle huge challenges. Just about anyone would have struggled to step into the role of governor in the post-Daniels era. In politics, as in sports, it’s tough to replace a star. And so far, to borrow a Colts analogy in the post-Peyton era, Pence has looked more like Curtis Painter than Andrew Luck.

But here’s the bigger problem for Pence: he is also living in the shadow of the current Mitch Daniels. While Pence has gotten off to a sluggish start as governor, Daniels has emerged as a leader to watch in higher education after just three months as the president of Purdue University. He’s proven once again that he understands the issues that most concern his constituents, and every time he makes big news at Purdue the shadow over Pence grows larger.

Let’s just look at the biggest policies the two men have proposed in the opening months of their new jobs.

In West Lafayette, Daniels has announced a freeze on tuition rates. To accomplish that, he is looking for $40 million in budget cuts and has said there would be no merit pay raises for senior administrators, deans and certain other staffers who earn more than $50,000 a year. In his writings and speeches, he is making clear that he intends to fundamentally shake up the model of higher education.

Whatever you think of the former governor, his tuition plan without question addresses a deep concern many Americans -- many students and parents -- have about the whopping cost of a college degree. He is tackling a very real problem that threatens the educational futures of many students.

Here in Indianapolis, meanwhile, Pence is arguing with everyone from Republican Speaker Brian Bosma on down as he fights for an arbitrary 10 percent cut in the state income tax rate. It’s a tax cut that hardly anyone seems to have embraced, and it addresses a problem that doesn’t exist; Indiana’s 3.4 percent income tax rate is both low and reasonable. And, so, Pence’s plan has generated little more than yawns. It’s gotten so bad that Pence’s supporters have had to spend money on a TV ad challenging his fellow Statehouse Republicans.

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Unfortunately for Pence, the commercial further exposes the heavy Mitch Daniels-shaped shadow that hovers over him, as it blatantly steals the music and Star Wars-like imagery that Daniels used in the most talked-about commercial of his 2008 re-election campaign. In 2008, the ad was innovative. In 2013, it’s embarrassingly retro.

In a recent op-ed piece in The Star defending his tax plan, Pence talked about the “fiscal stewardship of the Daniels administration.” He probably shouldn’t talk about his fellow Republican’s former administration. It just reminds people that his administration, at this point, pales by comparison. Seriously, the main reason you don’t hear many complaints about more aspects of the Pence agenda is that there really aren’t any. It seems the only time he makes noise is when he’s coming out against something state lawmakers have proposed.

Think about this: In a committee hearing this week, Rep. Sean Eberhart called a proposal to allow table games to Indiana casinos “the biggest jobs bill that we’re going to consider this session.” That is both sad and a sign of the dearth of ideas in this new Pence Era -- one in which the state unemployment rate, by the way, has ticked up.

Speaker Bosma, for his part, wrote a much stronger op-ed last week that urged Hoosiers to think about the fundamental strength of the Indiana economy as he expressed skepticism with the Pence tax cut. A dedicated conservative, Bosma reminded readers that during his years leading the Indiana House the state has cuts taxes significantly while improving Indiana’s budgetary condition. And although it might be more politically comfortable to embrace Pence’s tax plan, Bosma said that “comfort isn’t the point; long-term vision is.”

So far, under Pence, vision is desperately missing from the governor’s office. In its place is a heavy shadow that stretches all the way from West Lafayette and has many Hoosiers longing for the days when big ideas and big agendas were the norm at the Statehouse.